As a Critical Care fellow with our program, how will you handle the inevitable conflict with a patient's family member or loved in a healthy and respectful manner?
The family members and loved ones of ICU patients are under a great deal of stress and emotions. As you interview with Critical Care fellowship programs, your interviewers need to know that you can handle these conflicts respectfully, as they will inevitably happen to you during fellowship training.
"During my rotation in a busy outpatient IM clinic during my second year, I had a patient that was very irritable about the waiting time. As I examined the patient, he became very vulgar with this language about our staff and insisted nobody cared about the wait time he had experienced. First and foremost, I didn't take his foul language personally and decided to let him air his thoughts out. Once he was done and I was still performing my examination, I apologized for the wait time and assured him that all staff was doing their best to handle a busy clinic schedule. I reiterated that our providers were committed to providing attentive care to every patient, including him. I know this experience prepared me well for the emotional patients and family members I will be consulting during Critical Care fellowship training. I'm confident that my ability in this area will benefit all of your patients."
As you answer, you want to highlight your ability to empathize with the family members you are working with. Building a connection with them will help greatly to put their minds and emotions at ease. If possible, describe a simple scenario you experienced during residency training, focusing on your response to the challenge rather than describing the details of the conflict. When you discuss how you handled it fairly, emphasize that clear communication was instrumental. Describe what you took from that situation that you will put into practice as a Critical Care fellow.
